Hello and welcome to this confidence meditation.
Wherever you are,
Whatever is happening in your life today,
Let's leave that behind.
Let's focus instead on the breath.
Find a comfortable place,
Get yourself a glass of water,
Maybe light a candle.
Elevate your spine and sit up straight if you're doing this sitting up.
Otherwise find a comfortable place lying down.
Relax your limbs.
Let's bring awareness to your breath.
Close your eyes.
Relax the space between your eyebrows.
Relax your jaw.
Relax the space behind your eyes.
Take a deep,
Slow breath from your belly and count to four on the inhale.
Hold your breath and count from one to seven.
And breathe out completely as you count silently from one to eight.
Empty your lungs of all the air and then breathe in.
Count to four.
Hold your breath for seven counts.
And then breathe out completely,
Emptying all the air out of your lungs.
Let's do this one more time on your own.
Breathe in.
Hold.
Breathe out.
Now keep your eyes closed and settle into this calmness.
Settle into the feeling of new fresh air entering your lungs and exhaling all of your negativity,
All of your negative thoughts about yourself away.
You have infinite chances for inhaling,
Healing air and exhaling used air.
Keep your eyes closed and let's shift to a thought experiment.
Let's picture someone who has shown you unconditional love.
It could be your pet,
A family member,
A friend or even someone you don't know super well but that you feel has nothing but love in their heart for you.
Imagine their face,
Imagine their eyes looking at you.
What do they see?
How do they see you?
Try to be as descriptive as you can with this image of them and of you.
What stands out?
Do you see yourself this way?
Can you show yourself the same compassion and unconditional love?
Continue to breathe long deep inhales through the nose and exhale through the mouth.
Let's bring ourselves back to the body,
Back to the breath.
And let's start with the crown of your head,
Skin down your body slowly.
Where are there pockets of tightness?
Can we breathe into these spaces?
Can we continue to relax?
Let's keep breathing into these spaces.
Let's feel our bodies,
Let's feel our breath.
Let's truly be present in our body,
Whatever it may look like today.
I often find myself asking a question during meditations like this.
Who am I?
Am I my mind,
My thoughts?
Am I a composition of chemical signals interacting mostly without conscious awareness?
Is that who I am?
Only about 5% of our brain activity is conscious.
Is that 5% who I am?
What about thoughts?
Thoughts come and go.
I think about insightful things.
I think about mundane things.
Is that who I am?
How about the body?
Am I the body?
I spend so much time fixated on the body,
The hair.
How much of my hair makes up who I am?
Hair is already dead.
The hair outside your scalp,
Physiologically speaking,
Is dead.
Am I defined by those characteristics of the body,
Of the physical appearance?
Am I my reactions to a series of random events,
Sometimes in my control and sometimes not?
Who am I?
It's not about finding the answer.
It's about asking the question.
How can we avoid making judgments of who we are and who we can be based on individual thoughts,
Circumstances,
Physical characteristics?
How can we compartmentalize those things and realize that they're not who you are?
Know that you can come back to discover who you are in this space,
Continuing to breathe into your body,
Inviting calmness,
Peace,
And rest every day.
Let's end this practice with three big breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth.
Thank you so much for being here today and giving yourself a little bit of time and space to breathe.
I'll be right here for you next time.
Take care.
